Why Claire Williams isn't running from a dire 2019

The British Grand Prix is a big Formula 1 race for all the UK-based teams, and none more so than Williams. The squad has often had the spotlight of attention from home fans attending the race, especially in the years of Nigel Mansell and Damon Hill.

This time around, a couple of extra anniversaries will add to that focus. Firstly, it's 40 years since Clay Regazzoni gave Sir Frank Williams his memorable first grand prix victory with the FW07 at Silverstone in 1979. And secondly, in a rare move, the team is celebrating the pre-Alan Jones/Patrick Head era by marking Sir Frank's 50 years as an F1 team boss, an (almost) unbroken run that began with Piers Courage and an immaculately prepared private Brabham BT26 back in '69.

The anniversaries are a reminder of what a big role the Williams name has played in F1 over the decades, but they also serve to shine a light on the team's current problems. It heads to Silverstone knowing that it relies on the plight of others for either George Russell or Robert Kubica to get anywhere close to scoring a point. It's a painful situation for deputy team principal Claire Williams, who was just three years old when Regazzoni scored that famous first win.

"Racing in front of your home fans and not doing well is disappointing," she says. "I suppose at least you can't have your expectations dashed, can you? Because we're going in with low expectations.

"We know what great support we do have from our fans, despite where we are at the moment. We've got fans who stick by us through thick and thin, and I know going there and having that support, and feeling that support, will be an enormous morale boost for everybody in our team."

This has been a nightmare season for Williams and her colleagues. The disaster of failing to have the FW42 ready for the start of Barcelona testing was followed closely by dire on-track performance when it did appear. But as she admits, things had been on the slide for a while.

"To be fair the past year and a half now have been the hardest for the team," says Williams. "We probably thought at the end of last year that we'd been through the rockiest part, and then obviously testing happened, and we didn't get a car to Barcelona [in time for the start of first test].

"We thought we couldn't sink much lower, and we did. But sometimes you do need to hit rock bottom in order to really understand what's going on - what all the areas of weakness are.

"We've tried to take positives from it, I suppose, and to use it to learn. I think that's all you can do in any kind of situation like this. You've got [to] almost embrace it and work hard to understand it, and then make improvements and change off the back of it.

"That is what we're doing, and you can see the green shoots of that now. And we'll continue on this path, continue to fight as we always do, to make ourselves better."

"My job is to try and find the best people I can to work to create the fastest race car" Claire Williams

In its bid to turn around its F1 form, the dire 2019 situation meant that nothing was sacred at Grove as the team sought to find the root causes of its problems.

"That's what we've done with what we call our 'after action review'," explains Williams. "That was a very thorough piece of analysis that our strategy team did in-house, talking to pretty much everybody that was involved across each group, to understand exactly what did go wrong.

"And we have an absolutely thorough understanding now of what the issues were, and we've implemented changes already to tackle those areas of weakness within the organisation. I'm really pleased that we've done a significant amount to make sure that we effect change moving forward.

"It was mostly process driven, the failures of car build. It's about having a strong planning function in place, and I think our planning function wasn't where it needed to be.

"We've now rectified that and we've created a dedicated planning group that is eight people so far, and will probably grow a little bit in the future, that will keep track of the process from the start right through to delivery. It's really important for us that we don't make the same mistakes again."

Williams stresses that F1 has become ever more complicated over the decades.

"I talk to people in the paddock and they've had fairly similar scenarios going on in their factories," she says. "These technical regulations are so complex, and the parts are so many - this isn't 1990, when a car was made up of 5000 parts of whatever, it's now 22,000 parts.

"I keep saying that number, but it allows you to understand the significance of how extraordinarily big a job that is when you are an independent team with the resources we've got. It's quite impressive that any of us are delivering cars.

"Even since the early '00s our team is twice the size that it used to be, and trying to get all those people working for one purpose and communicating whilst they all understand where each other is at, it's not an easy piece of work. And we've got to get it right."

It's clear that there has been turmoil in the camp, and the turnover of key technical staff, particularly the departure of Paddy Lowe, has been eye-catching. So, what's been going wrong?

"I'm not prepared to go into any detail on personnel that may or may not have left for whatever reasons, I don't think it's right," says Williams. "But my job is to try and find the best people I can to work to create the fastest race car.

"It's not rocket science, it's pretty simple, and we continue on that path of trying to find the best people. I have enormous confidence in the technical management team that we've got in place at the moment. You can see that they are delivering, and that inspires confidence."

Nevertheless, Williams is looking for a new technical chief, and now that the Lowe situation has been resolved, it is legally able to search for a direct replacement.

"We can start building out the team again, but we're still working out what's right for Williams," Claire adds. "We've had various different types of structures in the past. The main focus over the last four or five months now has been getting everything we need through manufacturing, and making sure we've got race quantities and the quality we want.

"We plan for the worst case scenario [with the budget], then if things are better, great, and if they're not, then at least we planned for it" Claire Williams

"We've got upgrades coming to each and every race, along with a lot of other structural stuff off the back of the after action review that we did. And we continue to analyse what's going to be right at the top for us."

The search for staff is compromised by two issues. Firstly, the inevitable gardening leave of the incoming personnel will delay the hiring process, and secondly the prospect of going to a team that is so deeply in trouble might not appeal to the best qualified candidates.

"You can say purely on performance we might not be attractive, but Williams has also got a lot of other attractions that do make people want to come," Williams points out.

"Firstly it is Williams, and we do still have an important role in F1. We've got a great brand, and a lot of people of that generation grew up, and the reason why they're in F1, is they were watching Mansell in a Williams, and a lot of people aspire to one day be working for Williams, as much as they might for McLaren or Ferrari or whatever.

"And secondly, I think people do want to be part of that journey. I think there's a lot of attraction in being part of the team that turns Williams around."

Sorting the technical side of the team is one issue, but the commercial challenges are just as tricky. A slide down the pecking order creates the double whammy of a smaller share of the F1 prize fund and a harder sell when it comes to sponsorship. However, Williams downplays the suggestion that performance is a key to the latter.

"It wasn't easy in 2017 even when we were fifth, and it wasn't in '15 when we were third," she explains. "It's just the market at the moment. I think with F1 where it is people are still watching and waiting to see what happens in 2021 before they put their marketing dollars into the sport.

"As much as it's tough for us, I think it's tough for everybody. I don't see a lot of teams announcing new title sponsorship. The fact that we did announce ROKiT [with which Williams has since agreed a contract extension] off the back of coming P10, I think that says a lot about the attractiveness of our team, and the honesty with which we play things in our sport."

But given the considerable lack of on-track performance seen so far in the 2019 season, will the financial sums add up in the coming seasons?

"It doesn't make life easy," says Williams. "You can't predict these things in their entirety, but we knew this year we'd probably be finishing P10 and we can plan for that financially. You have sight of that fairly early on - we wouldn't go into a championship and then for the following year put P1 prize money down, that would be lunacy.

"So we always plan for the worst case scenario, then if things are better, great, and if they're not, then at least we planned for it."

Inevitably, speculation has swirled around regarding potential investors, with Dmitry Mazepin - who failed in his attempt to buy Force India last year - among the most obvious names. But Williams insists that no changes are on the horizon.

"We're not interested in selling the team, certainly not the Williams shareholding," she says. "We're very happy with our majority and controlling shareholding, and we want to keep it that way. But as any other team up and down the paddock would probably tell you, you're potentially always looking for a suitable partner, and for us that would be somebody that would want to come in and invest in the team.

"But we wouldn't do it unless it made absolute sense for us, and on the right terms. So, we're not looking at selling out - we're not looking at somebody coming and taking the majority and controlling shareholding. Equally, someone coming in and taking us private and de-listing us doesn't make sense unless there's investment into the team as well."

"It is extraordinary how you can go from hero to zero, and that's the way life is. I never pay too much attention to people who haven't done the job I do, and think that they should have an opinion about it" Claire Williams

But surely it's inevitable that, like Force India and Sauber before it, the team will eventually need a friendly billionaire in order to survive the current financial and sporting situation that constrains privateer F1 teams? Williams disagrees.

"I don't think it's an inevitability that our team needs - critically needs - an investor at all," she says. "We've been doing alright by ourselves for however long, and we continue to do so. Through whatever means we've always managed to secure a healthy racing budget, and I always firmly believe that we will.

"Clearly the 2021 financial regulations play into our hands, so we have a financial plan for next year that we have confidence in. If an investor comes along on the right terms, that would be fantastic, but it's not an inevitability that it's critical for our sustainability.

"I don't think any of us can predict what comes three or four years down the line. Something always does manage to come up for us. I would never have thought 12 months ago that I would be sat here having replaced Martini with a new title partner."

So what of Williams herself? The Netflix Drive to Survive series contained a scene where she questioned her ability to do the job she is tasked with. It was an extraordinary moment of honesty from an F1 boss, but one that she now plays down.

"People talk about it because they thought it was a continuing thing, and I'm still having a crisis of confidence," she explains. "I said it because it was a particular emotion I was feeling at a time of real difficulty within the team, and I think any leader at any time, whoever it is, whatever they do, would always have a moment of questioning their capability, their consciousness.

"And if you don't, you shouldn't be a leader anyway, because you've got to have a certain level of self-effacement and self-awareness. Inevitably, that's just my personality, I'm not going to apologise for it. Whether it makes me look weak, I don't know, but I don't think it does.

"I've always said that I wanted to do the best job I could do for Williams when I took on the job, I always said if I thought that I was doing the team more harm than good that I would step down, but I don't believe that I am.

"In these situations when teams aren't doing well people are quick to judge, and they want to place the blame and all the rest of it. But this is a team sport. I think I've played my part - one of my biggest responsibilities is making sure we bring the money in, and I've brought hundreds of millions of dollars to this team over the last seven years.

"People quickly forget about that, people forget the fact that I inherited a team that had come eighth and ninth over the previous three years, and I took it to third, third, fifth and fifth - and it's just in the last couple of years that we're having a torrid time.

"There are mitigating factors to that as well, we may not have been in P10 if it weren't for some technical collaborations that are ongoing. But hey, we delivered a bad racing car. It's what we do now that's important, and my focus, and I believe that I've still got a whole lot more that I can do and that I can give.

"And the stuff that we have been doing behind the scenes that people don't see - people only ever see what's going on on the race track, and that's how they judge us... Come and spend a day at Williams, see what I do, see the changes that we're putting into place. I can only be judged by what happens next year and the following year."

When it comes to the criticism of the job she's doing, Williams insists that it doesn't hurt.

"I ignore it," she says. "In the beginning I used to get a bit upset about it, but I've never been on social media. It is extraordinary how you can go from hero to zero, and that's the way life is. I never pay too much attention to people who have never done the job that I do, and think that they should have an opinion about it.

"Come and walk a day in my shoes, and then have an opinion. If I let it bother me I wouldn't be able to do the job that I need to do, and that I've been entrusted to do by my dad."